ML19249B077
| ML19249B077 | |
| Person / Time | |
|---|---|
| Site: | Crane  |
| Issue date: | 06/27/1979 |
| From: | Donaldson D, Essig T NRC OFFICE OF INSPECTION & ENFORCEMENT (IE REGION I), NRC OFFICE OF INSPECTION & ENFORCEMENT (IE REGION III) |
| To: | |
| References | |
| NUDOCS 7908290565 | |
| Download: ML19249B077 (28) | |
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UNITED STATES OF AMERICA NUCLEAR REGULATORY CCMMISSION i
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In the Matter of:
2' IE TMI INVESTIGATION INTERVIEW 31 of Mr. Richard W. Dubiel Supervisor of Radiation Protection and Chemistry, TMI m
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Trailer #203 9i NRC Investig4 tion Site TMI Nuclear Power Plant i
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Middletown, Pennsylvania I
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Acril 24,1979 12':
(Date of Interview) 13l June 27, 1979 (Date Transcript Typea) 14i 68 15i (Tace'Numoer(s))
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g 21; NRC PERSONNEL:
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22 Mr. Dale E. Donaldscn l
23; Mr. Larry L. Jacksor.
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Mr. Thomas H. Essig t
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892 935 25i l
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y MARSH: This is April 24, I have 4:12 p.m.
This Bob Marsh speaking and I am J
an investigator with the U.S. NRC assigned out of Chicago, Illinois, and we 4,
are currently at the Three Mile Island site and about to commence an interview of Richard W. Dubiel.
I would like at this time for each 4j 3;
person present in the room to introduced himself on the tape and further on l
the questioning if you want to propose a question or make a comment please Ol I
l by indicating your name.
This will assist the people how to transcribe the 7
l tape.
Dale if you would start.
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Dale E. Donaldson, Radiation Specialist, Region 1, U.5. NRC 1 01 i
Larry L. Jackson, Radiation Specialist, Region 2, U.S. NRC lli Thomas H. Essig, Chief of the Environmental & Special Project Section, 12l Region 3, U.S. NRC 13l Richard W. CJbiel, Supervisor of Radiat,c;- Protection and Chemistry, lx from Metropolitan Edison, Three Mile Island Nuclear Station l
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15i MARSH: Cick, before we start I gave you a two page memo which I asked you 17' l
to read and you subsequently read it and signed it, and in there there were 18I several questions proposed which I would like to repeat on tape here.
This l
19i letter indicates some of the grcund rules, the purpose of the investigation l
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and some of the rights we want to discuss with you.
At the close of the j
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I letter there are also three questions.
The first of which reads:
Do you i
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I understand the above.
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DUBIEL: Yes I do.
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MARSH: Do we have your permission to tape the interview?
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_i DUBIEL: Yes you do.
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1 MARSH: Do you you want a copy of the tape?
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8l DUBIEL: Yes I do.
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MARSH: And thirdly to you wat a copy of the tape?
12l DUBIcL: Yes I do.
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MARSH: OK I will provide both a copy of the ta s at the er.d of the inter-r 15:
view here, as well as a transcript at a later date once it is converted 15i i,7to transcription.
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13l DUBIEL: Thank You.
There is a fourth question which did not appear at the 19' end of the letter here, but is covered in the body of the letter and that 20 we addresses your right if you so desire to have a representative either 21j from the r.ompany or from the union president.
22l DUBIEL: That won't be necessary.
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3 MARSH: Fine, Thank You.
Then at this point we are set to procead, and Dale I wnld likr tc a,'s
-- to you.
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DOFALDS0i
.~. Dubiel I wonier if you will start by giving us a background
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on your experience, your education and training in the ne 1ar field.
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61 DUBIEL: First of all I have got a bachelor's degree in Physics from Fairfield
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i University, graduated in 1970 and a master's deg'a in nuclear engineering which actually covers the Health Physics field at Georgia Institute of 91 Technology, graduate ( in December of 1971.
From 1972, January of 72 through September of 1974 I was employed in the United States Navy.
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first two and ene half years of approximately September of 1973, I guess 12; that's only one and a half years.
I was stationed on board the USS Orian.
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I was a radiation as they call Radiation Health Officer dealing in Health 1r Physics work primarily with the repair work on nuclear submarines.
We had 15:
a Squadron 4 which was comprised of 6 fast attacks submarines when I arrived 16i and 10 iosi, attacks submarines when I left.
I also had responsioilities in 17]
I the area of emergency planning, emergency response for situations that 18i might arise with the nuclear submarines along side.he tender as well as 70, e
along side the pier.
These would be strictly reactor accidents, none of 20 our submarines carried Polaris missiles or any type of war heads, nuclear l
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war heads, but we were not involved in the warhead,vpe of casualty.
22 September 1973 I was transferred to the Navcl Region Medical Center where I 23l was brought in essentially to license, get license to nuclear medicine l
24 facility, which was subsequencly licensed a few months later.
Set up the 25i i
892 038
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radiation protection program and as a side line I also worked with the 6
hospital in helping to further develop plans that they had already made to degree implemented in supporting the Charleston Naval Shipyard in handling radiation casualties at the hospital.
Charleston Naval Shipyard was in the business at the time of overhauling and refueling nuclear submarines.
In 1974, September 1974 I came to Metropolitan Edison, Three Mile Island.
My 6!
entire time with Met Ed has been at Three Mile Island I started it off as a Radiation Protection Engineer assigned to special projects both in plant 81 and environmental areas, dealt very heavily with the radiation monitoring 9!
system, dosimetry system, and also went into emergency planning at that time.
The plans for Three Mile Island at the time involved only Three Mile 11!
Island Unit 1, Unit 2 was still under construction.
I arrived seven days after the commercial date of Unit 1, so we nad an approved plan at the 131 time.
My position stayed the same until approximately (the years are 141 starting to fly by) 1976 in September or October 1976, I was promoted to 15:
radiation protection supervisor where I got involved more on a day to day 16i operations of the health physics department and continued on with the 17i responsibilities in the area of emergency planning.
Up until September 18; 1977, at which time I was again promoted to supervisor radiation protection 19!
and chemistry.
I think my efforts in emergency planning were becoming more 201 l
and more diluted.
We hired an additional health physicist, some time in 21!
1977, to fill a position in radiation protection, engineers picked up a lot of emergency planning at that time is when we started going into a two unit 23 l
station.
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DONALDSON: Will you give us his name.
2' DUBIEL: Len Landry.
Len joined us, I believe in September 1977.
I might 3
i not be correct about the September, but it was late in the year of 77.
We, 4i at the time, we were trying to convert to a station rather than a single j
unit, a dual unit station.
In the area health physics, well both health 01 physics and chemistry we were going through some major changes the chemistry was in place very early in start-up.
But working under tremendously adverse 8l condit1... in a difficult day-to-day job.
Health physics was more pre-paration worF throughout the year 77.
Emergency planning became a fairly major issue both with the license hearing putting such emphasis on it, the ll) new regulatory guides coming out, and the fact that we did have to change 12!
our plans significantly to go for
. Significantly the Uh.
Let me 131 rephrase that.
The general content of our plan as objectives in the overall 14i design of the plan was not to change significantly, but rather the details 23 will have to be considerably altared to accomodate the dual unit and both 15 from a geometric layout, physical layout of the plans which was not very 17!
condusive to designing health physics en a day-to-day basis or emergency ISr planning.
Some major changes had to be made there as well as structurely 19!
administrative organization wise, so quite a bit of effort was put in, in 20 that time just prior to licensing to develop a dual unit plan.
At February 21:
1978 we were granted a license, 78 was primarily a start-up year.
We did i
2]d run some emergency drills in September and October of 78 primarily run out 93i
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i of Unit 2 although we did have a few drills in Unit 1.
Taking us up to 2S j
commercial sometime between Christmas and New Years of 78, Christmas of 78, 25j 892 940 a
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New Years of 79 and we have been an operational station since.
My position 2l has not changed, I am still in charge of chemistry and health physics both.
l He have additional responsibilities that have come along through the last 3;
couple of years.
One is the radwaste area.
I have takan over respon-4[
sibility.
This is primarily the solid waste, the processing of solid el waste, and disposal of solid wacte as well as industrial waste, wnich has 6i 7;
become a major evolution on the Island since the advent of the NPDES require-i ments imposed by the EPA through the State.
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DONALDSON: Could you very briefly describe where you fall in the line 10:
organization of the Three Mile Island stations? Specifically what I am 11!
interested in is where the health physics evolves.
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i 13i sIEL: OK.
Originally this is not a very simple question to answer.
14i Originally health physics reported directly to the unit superintendent in 15-unit 1.
This wns back when we only had the single unit operating.
We have l
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grown into two unit station and the organization had not originally changed l
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i until we started realizing that it wasn't working.
I was effectively ISI' reporting to two unit superintendents, cay-to-day opera?. ions that made 19I things very difficult.
I think management recogi.' zed he problem, and as 20!
j of approximately December 1, 1978 the organization was : hanged such that a
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superintendent of technical support was brought on the island.
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Limroth 2 2 ',
was appointed to that position.
He has been with us since approximately 23i September, officially in place.
I think December 1 is the date but I could 2 41 l
be off by a couple of weeks, one way or the other.
I report directly to 25; 892 941
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l Dave Limroth who is a superintendent I still am required to support the
^i individual units superintendent, with the appointment of technical superin-tendent, it allowed me to go through him to assist in priority between the 3l 4l two units.
Also, gave us a better direction in trying to support both of them on a day-to-day operation.
The superintendent technical support then reports directly to the station manager as does the unit superintendent bl from each unit.
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DONALDSON: Then the, your group essentially is somewhat autonomous in that 9I the line or chain of command goes directly from yourself through one additional 10l supervisor directly to the station superintendent.
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DUBIEL: That's correct.
Station superintendent, the exact ticle means 13i Station Manager which is Gary Miller.
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15-DONALDSON: Under you, would you briefly outline the first line supervisors 16' under your command?
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DUBIEL: To the foremen level?
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20f DONALDSON: That would be two levels, right?
21 22 DUBIEL: That's correct.
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8 LD50N: OK let's take it down to the foremen level.
3: OK.
In the area of health physics I have Tom Mulleavy, reports ctly to me as radiation protection supervisor and below Tom, reporting om there are four radiation protection foremen.
Did you want names,
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LDSON: Why don't you go ahead and fill those in.
EL: The four radiation protection foremen are:
Joe Deman, Pete Velez, McCann, and Fred Huwe.
They report directly to Tom, and are radiation ection foremen.
Also reporting to Tom are two radwaste foremen, Jim h, and Leo Hydrick.
Reporting directly me is a health physics engineer, Landry who reports to me and works closely with Tom in handling most of project oriented problems, something that isn't a day-to-day type of a lem.
Also there is a radwaste engineer, Ed Fuhrer, who reports directly
,e, again working hand in hand with Tom in trying to solve some of the lems associated with radwaste that are a little bit beyond the ability he scope of the foremen.
In the chemistry area I have four, let me up, three chemistry foremen there is no chemistry supervisor in an mpt I have and intended to follow through on as to structure'similar to HP site.
There is no chemistry superv,sor so the three chemistry men are all on a equal level.
There is a unit 1, and I will refer to s a Plant Chemist, Gary Reed.
Gary is very knowlegeable chemist in the of systems chemistry, demineralization, evaporation, the effects of 892 M3 3
9 system chemistry on Oe plant.
There is an equivalent chemist in Unit 2 again title Chemistry Foreman called the Plant Chemist Carry Harner.
There is a third Chemistry Foreman who is a Lab Chemist, he is direct supervisor over all of the laboratory work on both units.
His name is Ed Houser.
We have just recently and I mean in the middle of February, I believe, hired a fourth chemist Gary Chevelier, who at this point in time is pretty much still trying to get oriented and the intent was although no real steps have been taken but that Gary would eventually be one of the chemistry foreman slots when one of the foreman was promoted to supervisor.
I have one additional individua' reporting to me who is a tech analyst who is respon-sible for the operation of the industrial waste plan, his name is Ron Campbel.
Ron is the foreman, control room foreman from a fossil fuel plant, and has been working for me, working with the operations group and running the industrial waste plant, has a lot of chemistry knowledge, water chemistry knowledge and has been instrumental in again catting that system operatinnal.
That's it.
CONALD50N: In general, how would you categorize, and briefly? The experience and training of the supervisors under your control.
DUBIEL: Taking area by area Tom Mulleavy has got, I believe, in the order of 18 years in health physics.
Many of those years at Connecticut Yankee, I think the number is six or seven years.
He's also had four years.
His years at Connecticut Yankee were as a radiation protection sucervisor.
I think his level of, I categorize him as being a very knowledgeable Plant 892 144 I
10 hysicist.
I think in his academic background he may be somewhat t I think he has made up for it through the years of experience he in the field.
The chemistry, I mean the health physics foremen, I could pretty much group them altogether I dont believe that there rang academic background and I feel that there is and has been a r additional health physics theory training for the HP foremen.
everyone of them is a very savvy individual for practical health
, all of them have years of experience.
I think that Joe Deman will be the one with the least amount of experience, and he has got ars in the Navy as an ELT and five years at Met Ed as a senior physics technician.
The other ones all have at least that much nce.
Its all practical experience as well as what training they d as technicians or as ELTs in the navy ON: If I can have yc' answer one more question in relation to the Physics Foremen. Would you say that their philosophy of radiation ion, concept of radiation protection, is in accordance or in agree-th your own philosophy and the philosophy of Three Mile Island
?
I would agree with that statement.
I am hesitating because I just.
g through.
There is Uh.
Let me make one area of disagreement.
It of hard cause I don't think we have established, if you will, my phy of radiation protection and nor have we established that my phy is in fact the philosophy of Met Ed management, but I think 892 045
11 philosophy has always been a two-fold approach to health physics.
priority, number one priority of health physics is to protect the als to the levels or to the limits defined by existing regulation,
, if you need any clarification please ask.
The second thing is I have always felt that there is an awful lot that health physics for operation maintenance to actually make their job more efficiant ier for them.
I have always tried to be a little bit agressive in hysics in trying to work with the maintenance people to define in a job the best possible methods of doing a job to insure good hysics practice, but also to get the job done.
I think if there a differrence of opinion between myself and the foremen I have on I have the feeling that there has been an attempt to take the easy
, if you will, by the foremen that its very easy to control health quite often, in resulting, in shutting the jnb down completly.
just the easy way out.
I don't want to categorize all four of them that.
If I could say one of the individuals is being exactly the it would be Pete Velez.
Pete is tremendous at trying to get the Keeping that, in focus at all times as well as the radialogical but there have been times that I have been a little frustrated at ility to take the easy way out and stop the job and not offer to a solution to get to job done within the bounds of regulation.
J: Let's move to the radwaste side and the ef fluent control side, if you would give me the same general evaluation of the individuals ur control in that area.
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12 OK, first of all, they are reporting to Tom Mulleavy.
The radwaste are reporting to Tom Mulleavy.
The radwaste foremer are both operations type; they have had years of experience in plant opera-Jim Smith is a forme" licensed control room operator as c shift at one time.
They are more operations oriented than they are hysics oriented.
They do require and have always required that the d regulations be defined for them.
I feel that once those regula-ve been defined for them, they have done a reasonable job in insuring regulations are met.
They themselves had very little knowledge I until recently on shipping regulations, shipping requirements.
Of the inplant health physics regulations I think they were better, l
ustomed to just because their jobs as operators, but I think they time has progressed, learned more and more about the radwaste on just due to the fact that they have been working with them.
mse'ves are not on top of changes in the industry and things of ure.
It's pretty much being brought to them by people suct as Ed who is totally involved in up-to-date in existing regulations and in regulations, changes in the radwaste industry as a shole.
We
,d of relied on Ed to provide that technical guidance.
Jim Smith i
Hydrick as being more of the implementors.
Tom Mulleavy being not a direct supervisor but also being the strong health physics tie in re area of radwaste.
th OK, again if you would discuss if possible first your own philo-radwaste control and whether or not it's consistent with those of emen.
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DUBIEL: Wc11 in radwaste control it is kind of a hard thing to define.
Unfortunately, we got the wrong end of the radwaste control.
We were just given the waste and we had to get rid of it.
That makes out a little bit 31 black and white it really wasn't completely that way.
We did get a lot of support from the operations crews in trying to minimize radwaste, but I
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don't think that my philosophy in radwaste is much different than it is in et 7l:
health physics.
We have got rules, we have got regulations, we have got methods of getting wastes solidified and shipped that are within the 8!
limitations imposed by both NRC and 00T, and I don't think that any of us have any philosophy other than to do things in accordance with rules and regulations.
The one thing though that is very important in my philosophy ll; in radwaste is that we can vety quickly or could very quickly get the plant 12!
into serious operational troubles by not staying alead of the waste problems 131 in plant.
In other words insuring that we had adequate capacity for waste 14:
that we didn't get backed up and get to the point were we could not continue 15; to operate the plant because of a radwaste system being full to capacity, 16:
and getting outselves in a situation where were we would have to rely on l
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outside help in ge+. ting radwaste processed.
I will be very honest with you 181 the, we have not been overly successful at that, and I think the reason is i
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that we a lot of modifications that we have made or plan to make to it to f
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the plants, the station, have rot been completed.
We don't have the flexi-i 21!
bility I think we need, and I don't think the latest systems were designed 22 for the two units that we had adequate capacity to service the entire 231 l
station without significant number of modifications and essentially cross-241 l
ties.
We have run into at least two problems in the last couple of years 25 l' f
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14 where we have gotten outselves completely backed up with waste water and f
had an inability to continue operating in normal conditio_ns.
At that point 2;
it is more of an economic impact than it is anything else.
Our philosophy of complying with the regulations, and insuring that all shipments are made g
in accordance with the existing plant procedures which reflect the regula-H j
tions.
Our philosophy has never changed.
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DONALDSON: OK.
Final question relating to the organization.
How many rad-81 chem technicians are in your organization?
10l DUBIEL: We had March 28, 24 rad-chem techs werking in our department.
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were cross trained in both chemistry and health pnysics.
I will note 12l l
though that the two of the rad-chem techs had only been with us, one since 131 January and one since, I believe, in February, so they were really in the 14:
training phase and really were not fully qualified.
Of the other 22, at 15, the time he had 12 senior technicians and 10 junior technicians.
The 16 difference between the two being very slight, operation of the multichannel 17t analyzer and Ge(Li) systems limited to senior technicians, RWP issuance 18r limited to senior technicians and a few other minor details, but as far as 19:
the inplant health physics support they were pretty much equivalent, both 20; seniors and juniors.
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I 22l DONAL0 SON: Is the breakdown of foremen and rad-chem technicians under them 23j l
unit specific or are they utilized on a site basis? How is this?
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i DUBIEL: OK.
They are used on a site basis, but we try to rotate them in f
such a manner that we had some consistency.
For instance, on a typical i
shift rotation i you were a technician you would work six weeks in, a chemistry.
Of those six weeks, three would be in one unit, three would be in an other unit, then you would go to six weeks in health physics.
Again
,l three in one.init and three in another, always leaving the opportunity that Of for instance if you were in unit 1 chemistry tech that week and there was a
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serious need on your shift to do additional unit 2 work priority work in Si chemistry we had the flexibility to more the people from one area to another, 9 {,
but our main objective was to try to keep consistency among technicians.
10l Our back shifts were not supervised and we were relying on our senior 11!
technicians, and for them to have any feel for wriat was happening in the 12:
plant that they were wcrking in, it required that they have some continuity 131 in their job.
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MARSH: It is now 4:44 and we are going to break this tape end change sides 16i on it.
I at 4:44 I am reading 483 on the meter and we are proceeding with 17; side two of the first cassette.
Dale you were asking a question.
I will 18j let to proceed.
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DONALDSON:' I would like to move now from your normal organization and your 21l' involvement in the Metropolitan Edison functions at Three Mile Island and 22l begin to discuss the events involving the incident at Three Mile Island 23 Unit 2, and our specific period of interest, Dick, is the period from 0400 i
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cn 3/28 through midnight on 3/30.
What I would like to do is just turn it 25j 892 950 I
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over to you and let you begin with as much detail as you can recall realizing that it has been almost a month now and you were very busy.
To recall the sequence f events and what happened and if you can give us the general 31 time frames and will just try to listen.
If we have clarifying questions, we will try to ask those as we go alGng, but we will try to maintain the j
forward thrust.
When we have completed the sequencing period, we will come c!
back and hit scme details of various actions, so with that I will just turn it over to you and let you go with it.
8' 91 DUBIEl:
OK.
Thank you.
The first involvement I had with the incident was at some time shortly after 5:00 a.m.
I don't remember the exact time, but 11; that is what my wife recalls the phone call as ccming in.
I received a 12:
call and answered the phone and I was told that Unit 2 had turbine trip and 13l a subsequent reactor trip and I was required to be in the control room as 14!
soon as possible.
It was not indicated to me at the time that there was any emergency conditions.
I did not even ask who called, it didn't dawn on 16:
me to.
I got up I got dressed and drove in, and I arrived some time I am 17!
just estimating around 5:45.
Something in that neighborhood.
Upe1 arriving 18 I picked up my hard hat and my TLD in my office and went directly to the 19; Unit 2 control room.
My major thoughts at the time were that we had possibly 20; i
had an ES and another sodium hydroxide injection
'o the primary.
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DONALDSON: Would you define the term ES.
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DUBIEL: Another high pressure injection off of a 1600 pounds coolant low, 1600 pound RCS pressure signal.
Engineered Safeguard is what ES actually stands for.
Arriving at the control room, I did not, first of all I noticed that George KUnder was in the control room essentially it looked like he was in charge of the control room.
I noticed that Bill was aisc in Si j
the control room.
Immediately when George saw me arrive he came over.
He ci did not indicate what the problem was at the time to me, but he did indicate i
that we had, what indicated to be a leak in containment, and he was in need 8!
of a containment atmosphere sample.
He wanted me to draw a sample off of a radiation monitor HPR-227, whict monitors containment atmosphere, so I 10!
immediately went down to the HP lab in Unit 2 and I ran into Mike Janowski, 11:
wno is the senior technician that was on the back shift at the time, and I 12!
immediately mentioned to him that we had a request to take a sample off of i
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HPR-227.
He asked what type of sample, and I indicated to him we should it look at taking a gas sample and also change the charcoal filter which is in 15!
place on the monitor.
We immediately went over to the monitor, which is 1 61 only just inside the aux. building door from the HP lab, and Mike.
Now the 17!
monitor by the way, was not at the time in alarm.
I don't recall what kind lSi of levels were on the monitor because it has control read out but no local 19f read out, but the alarms were silent when we got to it.
We pulled the 1
20' charcoal cartrige out.
Mike actually removed it and as he loosened the 21!
wing nuts that hold the cap on the charcoal filter holder, he started 22 pulling it out, and a tremendous amount of water came out of the monitor, 23I
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and it got on his hands and on the floor and inside the bottom of the 24l monitor.
I immediately told him to put the thing back in.
It didn't look 25i 892 052 f
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like we were going to have any luck getting a charcoal sample.
He reassembled the filter holder and put it in and tightened down on the wing nuts and I 3l told him to go over and check his hands to make sure that that was not 4;
contaminated water, ano there was no question in my mind at that time that H[
we had some type of steam atmosphere in the building, and if we were getting nothing but water through the lines we were not going to be able to draw ei any kind of a sample, so I immediately went back to the Unit 2 control room
,I to relay that information to George Kunder.
Mike, I am under the L.:pression 8'i that his hands were clean because I can remember that question being asked.
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At this point I can't, I have lost confidence, I don't believe his hands 10l were contaminrted.
He, I think, would remember that, and I believe based 11:
on that, I at the time, was thinking steam line break in the reactor building.
12l Not, still not knowing what was happening I get to the control rocm and 13!
that is when George Kunder indicated to me that we had received, one of my 11 technicians had been requested to take a borcn sample of the primary, 15 analyze the primary system letdown for boron and they had just gotten the 16:
number back to the control room, and the number was approximately 700 PPM, 17i which is quite a bit lower that'the 1,050 PPM approximately that we were 18i running prior to shutdown.
This gave everyone in the control room at lot 19:
of concern and George asked me to immediately see if I can verify the l
20; number, the primary letdown boron concentration and that they need it for 21 shutdown margin, so I went back down through the unit 2 HP lab t.'
agh the I
22l auxiliary buildings into the unit i lab where our unit 2 sample sink is, 23l i
the primary sample sink is.
I met Dave Zeiter who was the technician that 24I' had ran the analysis.
I asked him what he felt hcw much confidence he had 25i 892 053 a
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in the number.
He admitted that this was getting close to the end of his 1;.
back shif* the 11:00 to 7:00 shift, and he was tired he didn't think he 2l had made an3 mistakes but he wasn't ready to swear on it.
It could have 31 very well have been a bad number, and that both he and Tom Davis and another 4;
technician were preparing to run a second sample and they had decided that 31 6l they would draw the sample.
It was already on recirc. so they would just 1
draw, each draw a sample, and both go over and run it and see what kind of 71 number they came up with.
Si l
9t DONAL0 SON: About what time was this?
10:
11; l
DUBIEL: This was approximately 6:20 to 6:30, something in that ball park.
12l I also received a call from the control room requesting that I make prepara-131 tions for a entry into the reactor building.
The RWP, the protective i
14!
clothing and that type of thing.
I talked to Mike Janowski, and I told 15 him, my first requested was that Mike, who I have an awful lot of faith in, 16; would be a good man to accompany that type of entry because of h:s ability 17',
to make good health physics judgement in the field.
He suggested though ISi that with the fatigue that his entire crew had that we might be better off 191 getting a fresh tech who was coming in on the 7:00 to 3:00 shift since it 20i would probably be a better part of a half an hour or so before we actually e
2]1 made the entry.
I agreed with him and told him, and both he and Pat Donnachie, 22!
j who was also on that shift, technician on the shift, to make preparations 23!
j getting scott air packs, protective clothing, the entire set up ready, in 24!
case we should make the entry in the near future.
Dose rate instruments 25!j i
1 892 054
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l
(
20 I
g the telecector and thct type of thing plus additional scott air packs for safety personnel, telling him to take them off the some of the safety emergency use, designated scott air packs that we had out in the plant.
3 The two of them went towards unit 2 at that time, and very shortly there-after Dave Zieter came out of the lab and indicated to me that both he and O!
Tom Davis got boron mmbers very similar.
I believe the numbers were 402 e!
and 405 PPM baron continuing to indicate a decrease in boron concentration.
/
j I became very concerned at that time that we were in fact deborating in the 8:
cooling system, and immediately told him to call the control room and get the information up to him, and I was getting ready to go back to unit 2 to the controi room to see if I could assist George Kunder in problems with the plant.
About that time we heard an alarm, a radiation alarm.
12l 131 DONALDSON: What time was this now?
14:
15 DUBIEL: This was approximately 6:40, 6:35 I think.
I am fairly confident 16 of the time because of very shortly thereaf ter the first technician from 17; the 7:00 to 3:00 crew, the daylight crew, they started entering the lab.
18r They come in typically, first ones are shceduled to arrive at 20 minutes l
19i 3
before the hour.
We heard an alarm which was coming back from the auxiliary 20 j
building Lait 1.
It.is a very distinct alarm from one of the fixed radia-21!
tion monitors and I immediately started down the passage way towards the 22l auxiliary building to see where the alarm was coming from.
Before I could i
13\\
even get down the hall both Pat Donnachie and Mike Janowski were apparently 241 at that time were coming back from Unit 2 were already at the area just 25i i
892 055 i
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I 21 i
outside by the hot machine shop by the fuel receipt area, and I noticed the first thing that they have done was to get the security guard who was g
posted back in that area out of the area.
He passed me coming down the hall heading towards the HP lab.
When I got there, they already had the ym dose rate instruments and were checking the levels of that area.
We identi-i l
f fied immediately that the radiation monitor that was alarming was in the bl hot machir? shop.
The hot machine shop was locked and we did not have
/,
l access, and Mike Janowski ran back into the HP area and anaer.d very 8!
quickly very rapidly with a pair of bolt cutters and cut c a lock on it.
I 91 really don't remember if we ever got the lock cut off, but the radiation 101 levels in the area very quickly were going up.
One thing that I would like to point out is that the radiation monitor set point in the hot machine 12l 4
shop was at 100 mR I believe and that is what I was thinking that morning.
I didn't quite understand why it was going off, but I figured we were 14l somewhere in the 100 mR range.
By the time Mike came out with the bolt 15 cutters, and we were getting ready to cut the bolt, the radiation levels 16 were up to 600 mR where we were standing.
One of the two technicians, and 17!
I believe it was Mike it couldn't have been Pat tried to follow where the 18i source of the radiation was coming from.
He immediately tu'rned towards the 191 I
Unit 2 primary sample lines that run right above that area, and saw that i
20!
l the closer he got to the lines the higher the levels were.
At the paint v
"f that the meter got a little over i R/hr, he was still se<eral fes from the 22!
j lines.
He yelled that to me and we all ran out of the area back to the HP 23l lab.
I immediately got on the page and started paging George Kunder about 24l a:: frantically as I could.
I think at that time it was already in my mind 25 892 J56
1 l
f 22 i
that we had some severe fuel degradation.
I have never seen sample lines--
e f
y that is an opinion on my part.
3!
DONALDSON: And this was approximately 6:35, 6:40.
3
,j OUBIEl:
About 6:40.
When I reentered the lab to make the page to George Of Kunder, the first technicians were coming through the door.
I distincly
_'i Ll remember Carl Myers and a few other people coming through.
I paged George he didn't answer at first I paged him a second time.
I found out later the 9i reason that he did not answer was that he was already initiating emergency 101 i
boration, which I think is understancable why he did not answer the page, ll) but when I got him on the line, I immediately told him what I have found 12!
{
and he indicated to me that they were already doina everything they could 13t to get cooling vatar and boron to the cooling system.
That time I turned 1C to Mike Janowsc.
I thought I had hecrd Joe Deman already come in the lab 25 but I didn't see him, so I turned to Mike c.cd told him that he was in 16 charge of the emergency control station until relieved by a foremen.
I 17; told him to start assembling his technicians into on and off-site teams, 18i and I t.urned and ran from the area.
I went out through the portal monitor 19!
out into the service, to the turbine building in Unit 1.
Just as I got to 20l the app oximately the Illinois water treatm nt area which is just outside 21!
the control point is when I heard the radiatico alarm, radiation emergency 22l alarm sound.
I ran a full head of steam down to Unit 2.
I got into the 23!
l control room very shortly after, a matter of minutes.
When I arrived, 24 f
George Kunder, Mike Ross were in the control room Bill Zewe.
I didn't pay 25i i
l 892 957 1
23 g
attention to what was going on at the console.
I went right back to the y
radiation monitoring system to try te get a picture of what was going on.
First thing I did notice, the vacuum pump discharge monitor, the condenser 3
4; off gas monitor VAR-748 was already up into high alarm.
Immediately deter-g mined that we had a primary to secondary leak.
I noticed generally that
-i levels were starting to come up, but there was nothing that really was ol bothersome to me at the time.
The dome monitor was into alert, was not in
/
high alarm, but we noticed it in alert and rising.
About that time I W,
checked to determine if anyone was making the calls to the offsite agencies, and was told that Dick Bensel and Ron Warren and round 1 two engineers from Unit 2 were both doing just that at the time.
We had some nuclear engineer specifically I remember Howie Crawford, who has worked with us in dose projection and assigned to that group during all of our drills was in the i
131 control room when he was breaking out the offsite and onsite maps and the it isopleths, and was getting set up to start projecting doses.
I recall 15:
looking at the meteorological chart and noting a very very low windspeed 16:
with the direction of somewhere in the neighborhood of 260 to 270 degrees, 17!
which would be a east to west wind blowing across the river.
I will be 18i truthful very very few of the events that took place and a lot of things 19!
going on that I really recall it,the things that I do remember.
I am sure 20s that there are a lot of holes that are just blank.
I 21l I
22' DONALDSON: When you heard the radiation emergency alarm sound, what type of 23 emergency would this declare?
24i i
25i i
892 JS8
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I
{
DUBIEL: It was a site emergency.
2' I
DONALOSON: And what time was this?
31 4i DUBIEL: This was 6:40 or 6:42 right in that area within minutes after I 5l I
left, within I would say after about a minute after I left control point in 6,i the HP lab.
Shortly after 7:00, Gary Miller had entered the control room, had announced that he was in charge, started getting statuses from each of the individuals who had been involved in actions in the control room.
He 9!
made perfectly clear that there were four or five of us in the room that would speak to him and that we would run our own areas, and that he was not 11:
to have everyone in the control room asking him questions or delivering information to him.
Those of us I don't recall the names, but I do remember.
13l George Kunder, Mike Ross, Bill Zewe, and myself, as being :,pecifically 14:
designated as those that would report directly to Gary as emergency director.
15, One of the first things he indicated to me was that we were not at that 16; time, and this was probably on the order of 7:15 tr 7:20.
We had not 171 received a return call from the State Bureau of Radiological Health.
I 181 immediately went to the telephone and called on a 911 line the Dolphin 19!
County Civil Defense, the switchboard or the dispatchers from the civil 20!
defense answered.
I asked for Kevin Maloy, Kevin was standing right there 21i with the dispatchers.
I gave the information to Kevin that we had a situa-22l l
tion on site that look like it could very definitely lead to offsite doses.
23 f
I don't quite recall may exact words, but I did try to convey the message 24!
that we were into something real that it wasn't anything, a drill nor was 25 i
892 J59 9
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i t
j 25 l
l it a typical situation with a small unplanned release, and that we did not i
y receive any word back frcm the State and that requested his assistance in t
getting the State back on the line to us as quickly as he could.
He assured I
31 me that he would get right on the line to them and get them back.
I gave 4,.
him a telephone number just to make' sure that they were calling into the g
- l J
control room not through the switchboard.
I gave him the direct outside el line number, which I believe is 944-6017.
About that time and I may be
/
jumping around a little.
I don't recall.
Sometime prio.r to my calling 81 Kevin, I had made contact with the HP lab and talked to Janowski about 91 getting the on and offsite teams moving, and the first thing was to get an 10!
onsite team dispatc'hed to the fence in the vicinity of the Unit 1 and 11, Unit 2 screening houses, and that he was to get them moving and establish 12l l
a radio contact with them and we would relay more specific locations 13l before they could get out to the fence.
At some point, and I don't recall 14-when, but at some point Joe Deman took over for Mike.
Instead of talking 15' to Mike I started talking to Joe Deman, and I don't recall exactly at what 16:
point that transition was made.
One other thing that was in my mind at the 17!
time, we were slow in establishing our emergency communications network IS!
between the the ECS and the control room, and as we had done on many a 191 drill I immediately went to the page phone and raised the EC5 director, at 20!
first Janowski, then Deman, on the page phone.
We found that communications 21!
was extremely good directly from myself to that man both Mike and Joe 22\\
Deman.
Via the page phone, there was no interference.
There was no one 23l i
else using them at the time, which is striking me as being odd you could 24:
never get page lines that were free, but there was absolutely no other 25j 892 060 i
l 26 I
traffic on the page system but our own.
The communications for the better part of, I would say, 20 minutes to a half an hour was primarily over the age.
Gaytronics installed the system rather than through tne normal or 3
emergency plan phone system, which calls for using phone talkers on various g
combinations of the M&I jacks and the page system.
The onsite team was m
J dispatched shortly after talking to Kevin Maloy.
We passed the word speci-ei jl fically where the individuals were to go to take the readings.
I believe that the onsite points were GE-9 and then GE-8, which if one were to look 81 at our emergency onsite maps would be positions first, GE-9 I believe is 9 l, directly between the two intake structures and GE-8 is slightly south of 10f the unit 2 intake structure.
The initial readings, we started getting dose rates back that were less than 1 mR/hr.
The PIC-6's that they were using l
have a minimal of sensitivity of 1 mR/hr, and they were getting no indica-131 tions.
They were requested to take a air sample and prior to them taking 14:
the air sample I suggested to Joe Deman that he pass the information on to 15-the onsite team that th3y use the plume from the cooling towers to help 16 line themselves up, that they were sure they were in a down wind direction 17:
from the unit 2 reactor building.
18l 19:
DONALDSON: About what time did the first onsite survey result come back to 20i you?
21; I
22l DUBIEL: Dale I believe the, to the best of my recallection it was somewhere 23:
i shortly af ter talking to Kevin Maloy.
I would estimate it around 7:20 to 24f' 7:25, in that vicinity.
At some point around 7:30, Gary Miller asked me 25!
892 961
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27 l
i for the status of the offsite teams, and I gave him the information that we had two teams ready to go offsite both available for transportation over to the west shore.
Gary directed me to make contact with the State police and get a State police helicopter to get one crew over there in a more timely 4j fashion.
5:!
He was concerned about the traffic--t41e early morning rush hour traffic trying to go up over the bridge in Harrisburg and then back down Gi and that it might take an hour or more to get over there.
He requested that we send one team in a helicopter and a second team in a car of driving 8l over at a. normal pace to back them up.
I do not recall exactly who told me 91 that they would get the State police helicopter.
I believe it was George 10 Kunder I do not remember exactly, but within minutes I had it confirmed to 11l me that the State police had been notified, and a helicopter would be on 12!
its way since there stationed up at Harrisburg, Harrisburg International 13l Airport.
It would be here in a matter of minutes, and that security was 11 notified that this helicopter was coming and would be landing somewhere in 15' the vicinity of the north parking lot, and that they were to allow it to 16:
land and make preparations to support its landing in getting our technician 17:
on board.
The technician that went over I believe was Ed Egenrider I have 1Si never had that confirmed to me but my recolection that morning was that he 191 was in the helicopter.
I believe the helicopter, the timing may be poor 20; i
but I am estimating 7:40 we had a man in the helicopter and sometime by two 21; to three maybe five minutes later the man was in Goldsboro.
Let me just 22 back up a little bit I skipped one item that of importance.
Sometime c3l l
around 7:20 and just after talking to Kevin Maloy I believe this timing, 24)'
the dome monitor HPR-214 which is an ionization chamber sitting on top of 25i i
f 892 062
ii
~
l t
j 28 y
the elevator inside the reactor building shielded by a couple inches of i
lead went past its high alarm set point, which is 8 R/hr indicated which 2
w id be, that does not include the attennation factor of the lead.
Gary 3
Miller immediately asked me whether we were in to a general emergency, and I indicated... were, the basis being the high alarm on the monitor.
He g
j immediately directed one of the shift supervisors, we had Bill Zewe from m
.j the off going crew still with the control room, and I dont recall who the
/l l
day shift supervisor, was Ken Bryan sticks in my mind, but that may not be 8!
the right guy.
Someone was directed to declare the general emergency.
I t
do not. remember that the second page went out indicating that we wera into i
10; a general emergency, but that the, I do recall the phone talkers, the 11:
C0mmunicators indicating that they were going through the call out list again, the call list of the offsite agencies declaring that we were into a 131 general emergency.
I also remember one thought in my mind at the time that 1N we had the 8 R reading was to look a reactor building pressure, because my 15; major concern at that time was a release path from the reactor building 15 through reactor building leakage and I looked and nated that we were at a 17; very low pressure one two pounds type pressure in the building, which gave 181 me some degree of hope that we wouldn't be releasing a significant amount 19j through any normal leak paths.
20j l
21j OK.
We are at a break point, time being 5: 15 I would like to remove this 22l tapt and start a new cassette here, so we are breaking at 5:15 I am reading 23 l
9R on the meter.
24i i
25.
892 963 i
a